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"Something of which You Can Be Certain!"
I have recently become interested in the history of my
family, especially in the old photographs I have been
finding in shoeboxes, dresser drawers and albums in my
recent visits with my relatives. I had the chance to see
many such photographs on my recent trip to visit my family
in Arkansas. Two stand out in particular. One is the 1912
wedding photo of my maternal Great-Grandparents. In this
photo, my great grandfather so towered over his 15-year-old
bride that they made him sit for the photo while she stood.
The other photograph that caught my eye was one of my maternal
grandparents about the time of their wedding taken just a short
time before WWII. Again, they were so young, that I am not
altogether sure that my grandpa was even shaving yet.
While it sounds a bit like Pollyanna, you can’t help looking
at the faces of those youngsters in those photos without
wondering what hopes and dreams they had for life together.
And it is also not possible to look at those photos without
remembering all the things which actually did happen in their
lives. As my maternal grandfather was fond of saying, “there
was a lot of water under the bridge, and some of it was muddy.”
That’s a pretty fair description of this life, isn’t it? We
want to look forward with hope and certainty, but no matter
what, one of the things of which we can be certain is that
some of the water under the bridge was and is going to be
muddy. And how do we know this, well, by experience of course.
I don’t have to tell you this morning that there is a great
deal that is uncertain in our lives. You know it already,
firsthand. The world around us is marred by terrorism and
bloodshed and oppression. Political leaders seek their own
interests and enact policies that make the people around
them fear the future. There are hurricanes, and fires, and
tornados which claim lives, destroy property and leave us
with a general sense of unease.
Of course we don’t have to look that far to find muddy water,
do we? We have problems that we might never have imagined.
Loved ones die young. Our health suffers and we are not
exactly sure what to do about it. Our careers and finances
are not as secure as we once imagined.
Our relationships are strained and plagued and often without
easy answers. Even our relationship with our savior somehow
gets tarnished as his church fails to live up to our expectations
leaves us disappointed and even disillusioned.
And then there are problems that we bring on ourselves,
time and time again as we fail to live up to God’s
expectations of us. We speak words that hurt. We
make the same mistakes over and over again, even though
we promised ourselves that we would not. We fail to
speak words in time, to think of others before ourselves,
to consider the consequences before we act.
Our lives are marked with uncertainty and there is little
that we can do about it. Then we hear a sermon. No, not
mine, but rather that sermon in our New Testament lesson
this morning, the sermon preached by Peter on Pentecost
day. It is a sermon full of hope and certainty.
Today is Trinity Sunday. It is that day in which we
pause before we launch into the rest of the Church Year
and celebrate all that God has done and continues to do
in his church, to celebrate, if even for a moment just
who our God is and what that makes certain for you and
me. So, what is it that of which we can be certain.
First, we can be certain on this Trinity Sunday that our
God is three and one. He is three distinct persons, yet
only one God, unmixed and undivided in a way that we will
never totally understand. And this Trinity works always
for our good. God the Father works to create and sustain
all that we can perceive and all that we cannot. When
the sun rises, it is God at work. When there is food on
our plate this noon, it is God that Father at work. When
the rain falls, the wind blows, when new life comes forth
from the earth, he is at work.
About God the Son, Jesus Christ of Nazareth, Peter tells
us that he came according to God’s set purpose. Who he
is and what he is able to do is affirmed by miracles and
signs confirmed over and over in the Scripture.
He was handed over to evil men, nailed to a cross, and left
there to die. We celebrate on this Trinity Sunday that God
the Father did not abandon him to the grave, but raised him
from the dead. He is now seated at the right hand of the
Father where he intercedes for us night and day.
Through faith in this saving work of Jesus Christ, we may
be absolutely certain that our sins are paid for, that we
are forgiven. This forgiveness alone, apart from any
effort of our own, has opened the way to eternal life,
as Peter says, to experience joy forever in God’s
presence.
And that is not all. God the Holy Spirit is also at work. It
is He that brings us to faith and keeps us there. It is the
Holy Spirit who is at work in your life and mine. A few minutes
ago, we talked of all the things that would make us uncertain
in our lives, now Peter assures us that we need not be shaken.
Whatever you have gone through in your life, whatever you
may be dealing with at this very moment, whatever may be
coming over the horizon, we do not need to be afraid for
our sins are forgiven and our future is absolutely secure.
The Spirit has one other job. Some years ago the Mercedes
Benz automobile manufacturer invented an amazing technology.
Maybe you remember seeing the commercials on TV. They
crashed a car into a concrete abutment to show the incredible
design that absorbed the impact, saving the lives of those
inside.
It didn’t take very long before other companies were copying
this technology. Not long after this a reporter asked a
spokesman for Mercedes Benz, why they did not patent this
technology - think of the money that could be made. The
spokesman replied to the reporter very matter-of-factly…
”Sir, some things are too good not to share.”
As we celebrate the work of our Triune God today, we do
so remembering that we have something, a hope, which is
just too good not to share. Each of us knows someone. We
each know someone who is living through something uncertain,
someone who is dealing with some muddy water. Maybe it is
a neighbor, a friend, a family member, a colleague, they
need the message of something absolute in a world that
seems so uncertain.
Why not tell them a story? Why not show them a verbal snapshot
of our God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
It was fun to look at those old photographs of my family,
and it certainly prompted me to spend some time pondering
just what uncertainties they faced in their lives. Yet
there is one thing of which I am absolutely certain. All
four of them were baptized, faithful believers in Jesus
Christ and I will see them in heaven.
You have the same certainty. You have the certainty that
through faith in Jesus Christ you will also live in heaven
forever. We are certainty because our hope rests not in
ourselves or in the world around us, but rather in our
Triune God. And in him we can be absolutely certain!
In Jesus’ Name! Amen!
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